Monday, February 25, 2013

Does the British system work better than ours?

Two weeks ago Britain’s parliament voted in favor of legalizing gay marriage. While this particular law has no real effect in America there are a couple glaring differences that must be noted:

1. British Conservatives voted 127 in favor to 136 against.
2. No Conservatives used the argument that if gay people are allowed to marry then who’s to stop people from marrying their pets.

The fact that you have heard the second point used as an argument in America goes to show how many stupid people reside in our country. That being said I want to focus more on the first point. Mainly that conservatives actually did their job and didn't just vote exactly the same as their cohorts.

Former British Prime Minister setting the standard

Side Note: I know nothing of British Parliament. While these results make me think that they are leaps and bounds ahead of the American democratic process, they still have a long way to go when it comes to food and dentistry.

Almost all Senate voting of Amendments, over the last more years than I can count, resemble this kind of split: Democrats 48-3 yay and Republicans 2-47 nay or vice versa. In the House the numbers are similar to 232-1 Republicans and 13-163 Democrats. From tax cuts, postal service, or violence against women almost every member of congress votes with their friends.

If you have 535 individuals vote on issues, what are the odds that every single time the same 215 always vote opposite the other 215? Even if they tried it would be impossible without conspiring with the other members. This is exactly what the people YOU are voting into congress are doing. They are casting votes with the sole intention of getting re-elected. They are not doing their job and voting in America's best interest. We might as well train 535 monkeys to vote against each other and save us some tax money. At least C-Span would be more interesting.

How do we change this?

As long as we have a two party dictatorship this will never change. How can we vote independent thinkers into office when the incumbents consistently pass laws to insure their own party’s re-election? (This is about the only thing congress is good at). I used to think the only way was a revolution. But that requires a lot of bloodshed and I don’t want blood on my hands unless it’s the good kind. After thinking long and hard I came up with a nonviolent solution. The problem is, I will need at least 100,000 followers/voters to get on board so we can start a movement. It will have to wait.